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When Dele Alli was subbed off at halftime of Tottenham Hotspur's 3-0 win at Norwich, a lot of fans were justifiably worried. It's highly unusual for Mauricio Pochettino to make any sort of halftime substitution except for in the case of injury or a major tactical change after a catastrophic first half of football. It hasn't happened often since Pochettino took charge.
Alli's "illness," as it was reported by the NBC announcers, was precautionary, and the club was quick to tweet a quote from Alli after the match to say that he was all right:
.@Dele_Alli: "I felt a bit unwell so I came off but I'm ok!" #COYS pic.twitter.com/MaKDNSGApX
— Tottenham Hotspur (@SpursOfficial) February 2, 2016
However, the Guardian is reporting today that Spurs still aren't sure what happened to Alli. Spurs have, and are continuing to, run tests on Dele to see if they can identify why he went all wibbly-wobbly just before kick off at halftime. Apparently nobody's sure, and it just might be "one of those things." Poche indicated that he's doing fine, and that he doesn't have any concerns about him being ready for this weekend's Watford match.
"Today, he was good," Pochettino said. "We need to assess tomorrow but all the signals are good. I don't know why he was dizzy. We need to do some tests next week but we have very good medical staff.
"We are not worried. We need to assess him and we need to know why [it happened] but we are sure it's not a big problem. We need to have some control. He feels good now but tomorrow, we need to assess him again. All normal, [he] will be available for Saturday."
We all joked around about Dele not eating lasagna before a football match, but obviously you want to take this as seriously as possible. Dizzy spells could be nothing, or it could be a symptom of an illness or other more serious problem. Losing Dele, who has been one of the brightest spots in what has already been an incredible season for Tottenham, would be a blow, but there don't seem to be any indications at this time that he's set for any kind of spell on the sidelines.